I Work at a Gym...........

millerll

I work at a gym. I’ve only been working there for three weeks. It’s a minimum wage part-time job working the front desk and keeping the place tidy. (Laid off engineer, lousy job market, etc., etc. Gotta do what you gotta do and all that.) The gym is on a military base, and every patron has to show ID to get in. We check each ID, and keep a head count on a clipboard. We usually open at 5 am, but since today was a federal holiday, we were on shortened hours, 8 to 4.

Normally, our wonderful retirees are the first folks in the gym. They’re usually lined up outside the doors about 15 minutes before opening, patiently waiting for us to open. Most days, they number around 5-10 people that early in the morning. Soon after, the active duty folks start to trickle in to get in a workout before the duty day starts at 7:30. I worked the full day yesterday, and it was pretty light traffic since it was New Years Day, and most folks were sleeping off their hangovers. Today, however, was another story……..

They were lined up 20 deep at the door this morning. As soon as we opened, a marauding horde rushed the front desk. It was like a zombie apocalypse of “resolutionists”. You know, those folks who think they can undo the last 52 weeks of bad living with their New Years resolution to get back in the gym. They ran by, flashing their ID cards so fast we couldn’t read them, all in a mad dash to get a cardio machine. It got so hectic we had to stop the whole thing and make everybody file past again one at a time so we could verify their IDs.

And of course, since yesterday and today were holidays, we had no contract janitorial service these last two days. I was run ragged just trying to keep the trash from overflowing. We use those disposable gym wipes on the machines, and the trash cans fill up pretty fast when we have three times the normal patronage. The floors were also getting dirty, but all the brooms and vacuums are locked in the janitor’s closet, which we employees don’t have access to since the janitorial service is contract. So I’m trying to spot clean floors with a rag and bucket. Fun. There were only two of us working today, and we’re both ladies, so no one could clean the men’s locker room or restrooms. I hope the poor gents didn’t run out of toilet paper.

Ah, newbies. They have yet to learn the finer points of gym etiquette, and they left the weights scattered everywhere instead of racking them. Collars were strewn across the floor like bizarre confetti. The dumbbells were racked so out of order that they resembled a Fibonacci sequence in iron. The phone rang off the hook as well. “Are you open today?” Why, no sir, we’re closed, they just pay me this exorbitant salary to sit at the desk all day answering phones to tell people that. And when we made our usual announcement that we would be closing in 15 minutes, we were greeted with howls of indignant protest. “I thought you were open until 11 tonight!” Well, yes, normally we are. But today’s a holiday and we’re on holiday hours. In fact, they’ve been posted on the bloody front door for three weeks. Sorry you missed that.

Four o’clock finally came, and we ushered the last patron out and started our clean-up checklist. The gym looked like Bourbon Street after Mardi Gras; the locker rooms like Times Square the morning after the ball drops. Just as we were finishing up a half hour later, four teenagers come strolling through the gym. Well, where the heck did you guys come from, and how did you get in here? Turns out, they had been playing racquetball in one of the courts, and in the rush, we didn’t notice that they were still in there after closing. Apparently, they didn’t hear the closing announcement. Five minutes later, and they would have been locked in, with the alarms set. It almost would have been worth it to see the looks on their faces when the Security Police showed up to let them out.

And it’s gonna be like this for at least another three or four weeks. I work at a gym. Pray for me.